Autism Answer: There Is Nothing, Until There Is Something

 

 

There isnothing, until there is something.

When I was aboutten I had a best friend named Rayna. We both strongly hoped to become wondrouswriters one day. We had similar wants from the writing we imagined one daypublishing. We wanted to be recognized as wise; as people who could use wordsto disturb readers into feeling and thinking differently; as writers who were special,spectacular, and unequaled.

Ourreactions to blank sheets of paper, however, were drastically dissimilar. Andher reaction, I confess, shocked and almost offended me.

I wouldstare longingly at the sheets, caress them first with my eyes, then my soul,then my fingertips. I would fall into the nakedness of those sheets, usuallywhite or off white in colour, and I would imagine being someone who couldprovoke those pages toward brilliance; the one writer who could commune withthe truth living within each unique page; craving to be the one author whocould unearth it, coax it into the light. It would pain me, that desire. Thatneed. Sometimes, when I was brave, I would find a pretty pen and draw a tinyheart in an upper corner, or a small tangle of vines, as is still my habit. (Iam now 50.)

Rayna, bycontrast, would take the strongest pen nearest and scribble angrily all overthe page. Her passion was clear, her need was tangible, her pleasure mixed withpain was on display. “I have to, it’s mocking me, I have to,” she would besaying. Maybe not those words, but that sentiment. It hurt me to see. I couldn’tunderstand. Even as she explained, even as she matched the intensity of feelingI had toward the same blank sheets, her action was simply unfathomable to me.

But I wanted to write, and I wanted to understand, and Iwanted to be all the characters.

So I tried.

We were best friends for only a year, but I remember ourfriendship often. I remember her need to scribble strongly, to take over, totake action on the intense feelings, often. I remember the size of my desire, mybelief in an immensity waiting to be discovered, my fear of ruining it, often.

I recognize both of us in others, now. I see how we areoffered a stimulus (something presenting itself, something happening) and howwe reach into the same grab bag of emotions (desire, dread, joy, fear, anger,love, worry) and how we take an action in response.

We so often don’t choose the same reactions, and we so oftendon’t understand each other, and we so often don’t try or want to.

There is nothing, until there is something.

I think it matters that we pay attention to and reflect onthe something we make out of nothing. 

Hugs, smiles, and love!Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)